Roses and Gravel
by Muriel Candytuft
Summary: When Emma Halliwell stays the summer in England with her reputedly eccentric great aunt, she learns more than she ever did in a lifetime.


Roses and Gravel

Prologue: Arrival

A/N: Well, Muriel's gone and started herself another fic! This is born of a little plot bunny that's been gnawing at my ankle for about a fortnight now. It's set in good old 2006. As you've probably figured out, all but my own charaacters belong to C.S. Lewis. Hope you enjoy.

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Jet lag and my first sight of the manor I'd be staying the summer in coupled to make me feel tireder and tinier than I already felt. The duffel bag slung over my shoulder felt pounds heavier, as well as the wheeled suitcase I dragged behind me. The United States was a universe away instead of just an ocean away.

I had never met my great aunt. Nobody really talked much about her; some of my family said she wasn't quite right in the head, being seventy-seven. Her contemporaries said she had _never_ been quite right after she lost her family to a train crash, and probably not before that, either. That was all I really knew about her, besides the fact that she'd inherited this intimidating house from a friend.

As I marched up the dirt driveway, I noticed a splash of bright red by the side of the house, glaring against the greens and browns of the British countryside. Tentatively, I altered course and approached the red, to find that it was a rosebush. Actually, four rosebushes; Crimson Glories, just bloomed. The tiny blooms turned crimson faces to pale sunshine; I saw beads of water glimmering on their petals.

I bent over, pushing my stringy hair away, and breathed their fragile scent. That's when I noticed that three of them were grown close together, planted in a thick layer of mulch--except for one. It stood about a foot from the others, rooted in gravel of all things. It didn't quite match the other bushes in size and lushness.

"I see you've found my roses," a voice cracked behind me. I whirled around, almost dropping my suitcase.

A tiny, elderly woman stood before me. She leaned so lightly on a rubber-tipped cane that I wasn't sure whether she was holding it up instead of the other way around. Her hair was surprisingly dark, edged in places with silver, and cascaded in a long braid almost down to her knees. She was neatly dressed, in a muted wool cardigan and jeans, and she smelled of soap, dust and tea. Her face was unlike any other woman of seventy-seven. Ancient, and young at once; warm and open in spite of the frigid blue of her eyes. Her smile was in her voice, not on that creased face.

I knew who she was, and yet, I couldn't believe this was really her.

I guess I had expected a gray-haired, shrewish librarian who lived on weak tea and screamed profanities at unsuspecting teenagers.

Feeling doubly awkward, I felt like bashing my fist against my head to think of something to say to her. It didn't help that I remembered my cousin saying that in England, you have to talk just so, or everyone will be mad at you. At last, I faltered, "Are you my great aunt?"

"Are you Emma Halliwell?" she asked, instead of answering me. I nodded.

"I suppose you've stumbled on the right place then," she said cheerfully. And she fell silent, staring at the roses.

I cleared my throat, uncomfortably conscious of my greasy hair and wrinkled clothes. "Um...I like your roses."

My great-aunt nodded.

"I just wondered--why is that one surrounded by gravel?"

She extended a thin hand, gently touching that rosebush, as if afraid she'd break it. "Emma, I planted it that way. Gravel's almost three feet deep."

Now even more confused, I stared at the doomed rose. There was no way it'd last long in gravel. "What did you do that for?"

"To remind myself," my great aunt murmured. The blue of her eyes met the blue of the sky as her voice took on a sing-song tone. "To remind myself of what I was once, and what I shall never be again, Lord help me." She closed her eyes for a moment, and then returned her attention to me again. "You must be hungry. Come inside."

She strode towards the manor's imposing steps, calling behind her, "You may call me Aunt Susan, or Aunt Pevensie, whatever you like, so long as you say it respectfully. And am I to call you Emmy? Or is Emma short for Emmeline? Emmalou?"

"Just Emma," I replied, hoisting my duffel bag onto my numb shoulder again.

"That'll do," she said simply, as she fished the house key out of her pocket.

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And the award for shortest prologue goes to: MOI! Sorry it's short, but it stands. What do you think?


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